Trippin' In Turkey - Part 2

Early morning lift off for another death trap

A friend of mine commented that I'd sort of neglected to follow up on "Tripin' In Turkey - Part 1" with the second instalment.  It's true I had.  I was momentarily distracted by having to fend off knife attacks going on all around me.  Well imagined ones anyway.  It was touch and go walking down the street for a while.  It really was so empty out there - not many cars on the road, very few pedestrians - when you walked passed someone you would lock eyes with them, sussing them out to make sure they didn't have murder on the mind and a knife in their hand.  My mate called it "Land of the Wide Berth"  - it was a spot on description.  People were afraid to get anywhere near each other.  Any noise behind you made you really uneasy - I always needed to know what and who was behind me, and I'm positive that there were people taking a lot more precautions than me, considering pepper spray had sold out online (yes, I researched it).  

Wouldn't you just love to give him a shave?

But little by little we realised there was nothing scary to see - except the news, and also a very frightening  incident, when a friend of mine spotted a homeless man doing a poo in a rubbish bin in the park while she was out jogging. At least he's stopped going in his pants though, I guess -  I've seen that particular homeless guy from our nearby park before, and I've seen his pants, and sadly they are more poo than material.  He does have a really handsome face though, so he'd be a top candidate on my reality show I'm thinking about pitching to the networks.  My show would be entitled "The Hot And The Homeless".  This is where you get a whole lot of potentially good-looking homeless people and give them a makeover. (I've always wanted to do this this anyway, but I've been a bit nervous about how I'd actually get them to leave my apartment once they were there, or how I'd get the ring of grime scrubbed off of the bathtub).  Besides the make-over, there would be tests the candidates would do such as the coin sorting scramble in a pitch black room (separating the crappy coins from the good ones in the fastest possible time), the obstacle street course while pushing a supermarket trolley, the running race against the cops,  the fending off of attacking street dogs, the 3 course dinner made from garbage bin sourced items.......it will be a hit I know it.  Should I be sourcing entertainment from the misery of others?  Well now I put it that way, probably not.  Maybe it's best not to mention it.......

Too familiar and too sad

But anyway back to the topic that's been on my mind for a good couple of weeks now - and while we're at it, put up your hand if you're sick of hearing about Palestinians and Israelis trying to kill each other.  I know I am - most of us over here are.  Pray in a square of land, don't pray in a square of land - how is it that people think this is something worth murdering and dying over? (yes, I know it goes a lot deeper than this really, but it all seems to come back to that contentious piece of Jerusalem real estate).  The lives some people live - it's remarkable how obviously wrong they are - don't they see it?  The rest of us do, clearly.  Luckily we've all realised that despite the hysteria we aren't really in any more danger than we are every time we get into a car.  For the rest of the 1.6 million Palestinians who live in Israel, and the vast majority of the 6 million Jews here, they all actually don't want to kill each other.  What they all want is to live life and hang out with their families and friends, and go to work, and eat nice food and sit in the sun and just chill the fuck out.   Maybe all the extremists on both sides will just wipe each other out with their violence and their hate and their bullshit, and leave the rest of us to make peace and be nice to each other.  It's a nice dream, and one that's typically shattered when I read about teenage Palestinians driving cars into people and stabbing old Jewish men in the nose and the face.  Some people have REALLY bad days - I'll have to remember that next time I complain about my pizza crust being too thick.

Cake by the window

I shall however, endeavour to stop going on about the mayhem and terror going on around me in order to finish telling all about my trip to Turkey - as previously mentioned we were out on the road in our very comfortable rental car and headed for the sea.  Despite being on our way to  the most touristy stretch of coast in the entire country, we managed to find a little nook of cuteness on the Aegean sea - Alaçatı.  This was a little gingerbread house town of cobblestones and coloured windows sills.  Seriously quaint shit.  Yes, there were tourists, but the busloads haven't seem to have discovered it yet, so we could saunter round and feel special.  We spent the night in the cutest little stone guest house and ate the most spectacular food at a restaurant called Babushka.  God damn it the food is good in this country.  I basically ate non stop for 8 days and because I spent that entire time sitting on my butt cheeks in a car - well let's just say things haven't been pretty since.  That kind of piggery coupled with inactivity is hard to shake off. 

Stone and shutters

The streets of Alaçatı

Midget Door

Cord strangely developed a week long fondness for sweet black tea

Twins by the Sea

The following night was spent on a hotel right in the heart of tourist land - the Bodrum Peninsula.  It was a giant hotel, and because of the low season only 5 rooms were occupied.  Management were dealing with this by switching all the lights off in the entire hotel.  It was really strange - when we turned up we didn't even think it was open, and there seemed to be a table of guests sitting on the balcony in the pitch black.  The porter showed us to our room - I had to feel my way along the wall to find the door handle.  It was another bloody case of 'The Shining', and yes I had more nightmares.  It's a strange feeling being in an almost deserted hotel.  You can tell that the staff just want you to piss off.  It's like that 10pm table that comes in to a restaurant right before the kitchen closes and lingers really badly, AND asks for desserts, AND then coffee.  You hate them all so bad.  And that's what it felt like.  All the staff were buggered after a crazy summer season and just wanted everybody gone.....well sucked in dudes - I'll have another coffee, yes I will, and you can get me some beach towels while you're at it.

Delicious water

Life sux

Vali and The Columns

I've said it before but my love for a ruin will never die.  God damn it I love a pile of old rocks.  It really grips me.  With that in mind, and despite knowing that they'd be hundreds of people ticking another one of Turkey's "Must Sees" off their list, I really pushed my family into driving several hours for a viewing of the ancient Greek city of Ephesus.  I'm never disappointed - show me a hole in the ground and tell me that a ancient Roman took a shit in it and I'll strain my pointer finger taking pictures.  If it's old and crumbling to pieces - I'm there with bells on.  There sure were a lot of Chinese visitors.  The Chinese have taken over the world as the number one bus travelling tourists.  They are the Japanese Tourists of the 80s equivalent with a few differences.  More pushing and more littering would be one.  The smell of mothballs another.  They are however, very eager for a chat - dudes are friendly fuckers when they want to be.  Plus they love a blonde.  And I have 2 of them = 20,000 pictures of Vali and Cordi are currently being put into Chinese holiday photo albums.  I couldn't make it into the same hair colour category this round - after an unfortunate keratin treatment I'd been bumped into the orange group - and not a sexy gingernut/I'm hot in bed category - the "something went wrong at the hairdressers look".  I know it all too well.

Check the dude in the background getting the "up" angle on his girlfriend

It's old, it's good.

Apocalypse Shelter

After the rock bonanza we headed inland to a little town called Şirince - home to 600 residents. It was cute enough, but the interesting thing about it was that this town swelled by about 60 000 people on December 21st 2012.  Apparently the Mayan predictions of doom and catastrophe indicated that anyone who was in Şirince would be totes fine.  The doomsday escapers flocked there in packs, feeling totally superior to everyone else on the planet (until dawn the next day I guess).  They must have been spewing the morning after.  "Hey guys, the world didn't explode, total bummer man.  All 5 billion are still alive - it's the WORST".   Some of them probably maxed out their credit cards before they left home deliberately, or took out double mortgages, or sold everything they owned at rock bottom prices.  The Şirince locals were thrilled - 60 000 tourists sure spend up big time when they think they're either going to be dead the next day, or the rest of the world will be at least.  One local was making a special "Wine Of The Apocalypse" wine that he was flogging off to all the believers - so at least they had a nice take home souvenir from their failed attempt at salvation.  "It's the first time we've seen such an interest here in the winter season" said one enthusiastic local.  The Lord Mayor of Şirince probably slipped a secret postscript at the bottom of the prophecy hieroglyphs or something last time he was in Mexico. 

Feel that Mayan Protection - just feel it

For all your Doomsday Needs

Meanwhile in Pic De Bugarach in France - those dudes who couldn't get to Turkey were waiting to be rescued by UFOs.  According to those in the know, an alien spaceship — presumably commanded by otherworldly humanitarians — was going to fly out from its subterranean hangar below Pic de Bugarach and beam up every person in the area, ferrying them to some intergalactic safe haven.  Can you imagine all the alien groupies' disappointment when they had to finally admit to themselves that the aliens weren't coming and go home?  It's worse than a particularly bad thrashing at the MCG on Grand Final Day for the loser's supporters.  Apparently the French locals were onto it with the wine thing as well - making bottles of stuff that "allows better communication with aliens" - just drink 3 bottles to yourself - you'll see aliens everywhere.

The surprise wake up view

My absolute favourite stop was the night we spent in Kaş on the Mediterranean. The drive around the coast at sunset was such an incredibly beautiful sight, and one I won't forget in a hurry. Trying to find accommodation in the dark was a little tricky - I'd found somewhere awesome but they didn't have a website so we just turned up and hoped for the best.  They had no rooms in the main building, but could give us a villa at off season rates.  We were like "fuck it, let's get on", and I'm so glad we did.  The room had a spa bath in the lounge room that connected with a pool outside.  What kind of bullshit is that?  Unfortunately it was not exactly hot - try freezing cold - but kids have no sensitivity in their skin when it comes to cold water so the girls had the time of their lives.  I waited until the sun came up before taking my dip.  The seawater was ridiculously clear, and the rocky beachfront had all these ladders leading into the water - which were fine until the waves picked up and then steering back in against the surging current without being sucked into the rocks was a little bit of an adventure...... in swear-land.

Coastal Sunset

Amazeballs

Looks great, was freezing

Breakfast of Champions

Peek-a-boo

Last stop on the whirlwind road trip of Turkey was Cappadocia - another place of fond memories from my glitter eye shadow tour of Turkey in '97.  This is the amazing landscape of fairy chimneys and underground cities all formed from volcanic ash and erosion, and mentioned as being inhabited as early as the 6th Century BC.  It really is an incredible place, and it has the hoards of tourists to prove it.  There are so many busloads just rolling in one after the other that all the people who live there seem kind of jaded.  Three million tourists visit there every year - that is a shitload.  But to put it into perspective with a fucking far out comparison - 3.5 million people pass through Shinjuku Train Station in Tokyo EVERY DAY.  How the hell is that???  Cappadocia knows nothing, NOTHING - try being a ticket master in Japan you basic  Cappadocian bitches - then you'll know hoards of people.  

Last time I was there, I stayed in some peasant backpackers with fleas in the floor mat, did several shits in some of the fairy caves (still had a bit of explosive diarrhoea from eating food made with rancid oil that had been left out in the sun at my previous peasant accommodation), rode round on a motorbike feeling way cool, and went exploring in the incredible valleys - going though low-roofed tunnels and into fairy chimneys painted like churches inside, and underground to cities that were 7 stories below, and the places where the inhabitants hid when raiders came to town.  This time I stayed in a gourmet cave, dragged my howling kids through the desert in the sun, they did shits in the fairy caves, and then I made them climb giant rocks and admire the scenery.  The breakfast we had on the roof of our hotel was particularly memorable, not for the incredible view (although it was), but for the wasps that basically attacked us and tried to eat our food.  I nearly drank one- who knew they liked coffee? I hate wasps - what purpose do they possibly serve except to terrify?

Tree Head

The Castle

Explorations in Fairyland

Wasp Headquarters

Wow

Looming high on the "Must Do's" was a balloon ride.  Particularly for me and one of my daughters - my husband wasn't phased and my other daughter was terrified, so we decided to leave them behind.  It was pretty hard to get a booking at 11am the night before.  All the companies were full and the salespeople told us to nick off, except for one who said he'd call us in the morning if they had cancellations - yeah sure.  I took it on the chin and spent half an hour Google searching "hot air balloon accidents in Cappadocia" to make myself glad I wasn't going after all.  It wasn't a cheery read really, apart from crashing into other balloons and electrical lines, apparently you get burnt by that giant gas fire 10cm above your head.  I went to sleep happy that my hair wouldn't be catching fire the next morning.  But low and behold there was a telephone call at 5am.  As we were in a cave, it was pitch black and I couldn't see one little thing, especially not the telephone.  But I caught it just in time (after smashing a glass and knocking over a lampshade), and low and behold there were two cancelled places available, and they were coming for us in 15 minutes.  Vali and I whipped on our clothes in record time, and were out waiting in the cold, when some dude rocked up and whisked us away to cough up mega bucks before dumping us at some roadside restaurant with baskets of 30 Chinese tourists preparing for take off.  His last words before he burned off were "If the pilot asks, you better tell them that your daughter is seven".  I felt a jab of uneasiness as pictures of crashed balloons replayed in my mind.  

Truly incredible

But before too long we were whisked off to another area where our balloon was being blown up right in front of our eyes.  The air was dotted with the magical sight of multi-coloured balloons at various heights throughout the sky over the most incredible landscape.  It was thrilling.  A quick explanation of how to brace for a crash landing (*refuses to think about skin being seared off back), and we were in the basket and up up and away......in my beautiful, my beautiful ballooooooonnn.  And it really was a magical experience - seeing all of that incredible panorama unfolding before you - laid out across the desert floor at sunrise.  I'll never forget it - it was spectacular.  Vali loved it as well - she was one excited little monkey, gripping my hand and giggling - always up for adventure is my little Valsie.  I don't think she'll ever forget the whole experience, and neither will I.

Balloon Girl

Here we go

Magnificent

Yay - we didn't kill you - that champagne tasted like red bull by the way

She wore her balloon medal for days

Turkey was amazing....again.  I was completely obsessed with it when I visited all those years ago, and trying not to be too expectant this time just in case.  But it was every bit as brilliant as it was the first time - maybe more so, because I got to share it with my husband who'd only been to Istanbul before, and my little poppets who really behaved like angels considering they spent a shitload of time in the car - an occupation fascinating for adults and less so for kids. But it was time to leave one Middle Eastern hot pot of violence for another - our home - the never calm, always crazy, rarely boring, the one and only Israel.  It's always good to go home.....despite those pernickety stabbers. 

I love my city